Wow, a libertarian on LewRockwell.com rakes conservatives over the coals for losing their way.

It’s a long article. I’ve included a few snippets below to give you a taste of what’s in the body of the article.

If you examine the positions taken by hard core libertarians, those people are truly “conservative” in the old-time traditional limited government sense.

The modern “conservative” is for a huge expansion of government’s regulation of individual liberty, and enforcement of controls over our forms of speech and communication and entertainment.

The modern “conservative” wishes to elect people and appoint activist judges in order to directly impose a kinder gentler theocratic form of law, in the guise of “traditional values”. This is a violation of the Bill of Rights’ prohibition on the establishment of religion, and that’s a very “conservative” attitude for the so-called conservatives to be taking. [In another post today or tomorrow, I’ll be talking about how the so-called conservative Rick Santorum has recently declared that he does not believe we have a “right to privacy” - and THAT’s a very un-conservative radical theocratic idea, for if we do away with the right to privacy, then the government is freed from all manner of restraint, and can interfere in our personal lives to a far greater extent that today.]

But I digressed into my own criticisms of modern conservativism. It’s better for you to to see what a real conservative has to say, a conservative of the libertarian variety in terms of limited government:

The Decline and Fall of Conservatism by Butler Shaffer

[. . .]
There was a time when conservative thought was actually characterized by . . . thought! . . . Such men and women had their disagreements, but there was a shared understanding that individual liberty, private ownership of property, the marketplace, and a continuing distrust of state power, were essential to a free and productive society. These values were fervently embraced, and not simply used as slogans to be stuck into meaningless political platforms and then contradicted as soon as the next session of congress convened.

[…]
Conservatism lost its principled bearings, I believe, when it substituted anti-communism for individual liberty during the Cold War years. To be a “conservative” suddenly meant to be staunchly anti-communist, a position also taken by Adolf Hitler; and ought to have foreshadowed the future of a political philosophy – originally rooted in anti-totalitarian premises – that was to become twisted into its antithesis.

[…]

The events of 9/11 – whoever the responsible parties might have been – satisfied the state’s need for an enemy that would rationalize the continuing accumulation of power over Americans. Being in power, conservatives had no interest in the pursuit of inner-directed principles that might serve as an anchor to the ship-of-state. In the struggle between individual liberty and state power, conservatives used to embrace a presumption for liberty. For most modern conservatives, liberty is simply a hindrance to an all-reaching police-state. Those who insist upon protecting liberty get labeled “traitors” or “America-haters.” To conservatives and liberals alike, power has become its own purpose.

The inner, reflective life that once made conservatives interesting people, has given way to the outward, reactive anger of the brute. If you doubt this, listen to the content of what any of the modern conservatives have to offer. Does any of it challenge your thinking, or inform your mind in any productive way? Typical of this reactive mindset is Fox Snooze’s Bill O’Reilly, who recently dismissed the thoughtful British MP, George Galloway, as “an idiot.” After Ken Livingstone, the mayor of London, blamed Western governmental interference in the Middle East for the recent subway bombings in his city, O’Reilly also called the mayor “an idiot.”
[…]

O’Reilly’s Fox Snooze colleague, John Gibson, recently demonstrated his commitment to the frenzied moral confusion of modern conservatism. After a man – later acknowledged to have had no connection with terrorism – was tackled, held to the ground, and then shot five times in the head by London police, Gibson applauded the British government for being so “ruthless.” “I love the way the Brits have 10 million cameras sticking up the nose of every citizen,” he went on, adding that “five in the noggin is fine.” He did admit that there would be “hell to pay” if the dead man had nothing to do with terrorism, but that price will not be paid in terms of the violation of any moral principles enlightening Mr. Gibson’s judgments.

The moral and intellectual bankruptcy of modern conservatism is to be found throughout the media. The appeal is increasingly to the reptilian hulks who are drawn to rhetoric that appeases their unfocused sense of anger. To speak of introspection – upon which a responsible, centered life depends – is to invite the charge of “appeasement” or “sympathy” for terrorists.

[…]